Grab the filename in Unix out of full path

Question

I am trying to get "abc.txt" out of /this/is/could/be/any/path/abc.txt using Unix command. Note that /this/is/could/be/any/path is dynamic.

Any idea?

Solution 1

In bash:

path=/this/is/could/be/any/path/abc.txt

If your path has spaces in it, wrap it in "

path="/this/is/could/be/any/path/a b c.txt"

Then to extract the path, use the basename function

file=$(basename "$path")

or

file=${path##*/}

Solution 2

basename path gives the file name at the end of path

Edit:

It is probably worth adding that a common pattern is to use back quotes around commands e.g. `basename ...`, so UNIX shells will execute the command and return its textual value.

So to assign the result of basename to a variable, use

x=`basename ...path...`

and $x will be the file name.

Solution 3

You can use dirname command

$ dirname $path

Solution 4

You can use basename /this/is/could/be/any/path/abc.txt

View more solutions

Comments

[sorpigal]

file=${path##*/} will work in ksh as well; in fact, bash borrowed this feature from ksh. Any sh on any Linux system is likely to support this, too.

[TimGJ]

I've tried this and basename seems to be falling over on paths where there is a space in the name.

[Keith Thompson]

It should be enclosed in double quotes to avoid problems with funny characters in the file name: file="$(basename $path)" or file="${path##*/}"

[tonymarschall]

keep an eye on the times ... answered Apr 12 '12 at 13:15 vs Apr 12 '12 at 13:16

[thebunnyrules]

You answer is good, but if the designer wants the script to work with paths that have space, the first answer needs quotation marks around the $path, so: file=${basename "$path"} . I've made an edit of the answer to fix that but I think it needs your approval. @Keith Thompson, file="${basename $path}" wouldn't work, the quotes need to be on $path or the basename function won't work properly.

[Marcono1234]

That is the reverse what OP is asking for: dirname any/path/abc.txt -> any/path, while they were asking for abc.txt

[Merlin]

This is really useful, and basename can remove file extensions as well.